A couple was booked with child desertion in Chalmette this week after leaving two loaded handguns in a vehicle with their six children. The couple had left their children, ages 5 months to 7 years old, in the car as they shopped for about 20 minutes in a Chalmette store, St. Bernard Parish Sheriff Jimmy Pohlmann said.

Shelve Smith

Shelve Smith, 27, and Regina Lee, 24, who said they didn't have a permanent address, left one gun between the driver's seat and the console and the other loaded gun between the passenger's seat and the console, according to the Sheriff's Office. The incident occurred in the mid-afternoon on Monday, April 1, and the couple has since been released on a bond from the St. Bernard Parish Prison.

"This could have easily ended in a tragedy,'' Pohlmann said. "To leave two loaded guns with your very young children in a parked car is the height of idiocy. Just leaving the kids alone, period, in a store parking lot at their ages was criminally negligent.''

A passerby noticed the children alone in the vehicle and notified a sheriff's deputy who was at the store working an off-duty security detail, Pohlmann said. The children were released to a relative after their parents were arrested.

The couple allegedly told deputies that they currently are homeless and that's why they don't have a permanent address.

Pohlmann said several adults are arrested each year for leaving children alone in vehicles while they shop.